Why no Duma statues?

[Jotari]

So Mila has her shrines strewn all throughout the land. Even in Rigel. Where she has no influence, and if she ever was worshipped, it was thousands of years ago. Isn't that...sort of weird? Why aren't there Duma Shrines strewn throughout the place. Are there and our heroes just don't visit them because they're infidels? Even in Duma's own lair there's a Mila Statue, which is broken...which just raises more questions for me. Why wasn't us just destroyed out right!? If it's broken just from disrepair, who was maintaining the other ones throughout Rigel? Would if really have been that weird to just change the Mila Shrines to Duma Shrines starting from Chapter 4? I mean, you might question then how they're getting the power to promote by worshipping and idol of Duma, but I don't think Mila was legitmately granting any powers through those shrines at present since she's sealed in a sword during the game.

[Interdimensional Observer]

I think the Mila statues in SoV are everywhere just for the sake of convenience.

And on the Mila's imprisonment point- you don't know she is captured until the end of Act 3 Celica.

How do you get the power to promote via statues? Probably just a gameplay thing. Or Mila has servant or has endowed some of her power into all of the statues in some unexplained way, and this also explains where the advice voice and fatigue restoration come from.

Duma however is bad. The entire cast is Zofians pretty much, who'd never worship Duma (yet the Mountain Village strangely has a Duma worshipper in it). 

[Hawkwing]

Quick answer: IS didn't want to waste time or resources building a completely new statue that may only be used once or twice, and it was easier to adjust an already present model.

The in-universe answer; by the time the game starts, the Duma Faithful went from a standard and possibly even benevolent religion to a fanatical cult filled with people who sacrificed their souls, wield dark magic, and raise the dead, so it makes since that general populace wouldn't put up shrines everywhere. Even in Zofia, Mila statues were only located in dungeons, many of which are shrines, and her Temple, so the rarity of Duma statues makes sense.

As for the Mila statues in Rigel:

• The one in fear mountain may be the work of a rebellious priest/cleric, or since the dungeon holds quite a few treasures and a resurrection shrine, Duma may have not been picky about who was up for the challenge and added the statue so a brave Zofian may be more willing to explore it. It may also have been a taunt against the Zofian's laziness while promoting Rigel's strength by essentially saying "Look at the Zofians! Barely halfway through, and already they need a break! The people of Rigel have barely broke a sweat, and scoff at their weakness!"
• The secret shrine is, well, secret, and small, so why waste time making a new model for it?
• Considering that he was kicked out by Jedah, Sage Halcyon may have set them up in the Lost Treescape to ask Mila, in vain, to help the Duma Faithful return to their previous state as a proper religion instead of a cult. (On a side note, Sage Halcyon really needed more screen time and a memory prism. It would have been very interesting to see what Rigel was like in it's prime, before Duma went mad.)
• As for the one in Duma's temple, I see two explanations: 1. It was set up by a rouge priest/cleric who pretended to worship Duma but secretly worshiped Mila, and when Duma found out, he ordered the statue broken, but didn't have the heart to destroy it. 2. It was set up by Duma himself as a memoir to pay respects to his sister despite their differences, but again, ordered it broken, but not destroyed.

Also, Mila may not be the one promoting your units, though that relates to the unexplained issue of why crests and seals give units better armour, a horse, and/or a new weapon to wield, so this question isn't limited to this game.

[Jotari]

10 minutes ago, Hawkwing said:

Quick answer: IS didn't want to waste time or resources building a completely new statue that may only be used once or twice, and it was easier to adjust an already present model.

I don't know about that. They bothered to make a new statue model for every one of the Over Classes. I doubt people would have complained about being short changed if that was just one universal Naga statue or something. Probably more came down to the fact that nobody questioned it in Gaiden so why even bother thinking about changing them now.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Jotari

[Hawkwing]

3 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I don't know about that. They bothered to make a new statue model for every one of the Over Classes.

That was for the DLC, after the main game was (presumably) finished, so they had the time to create the statue models. That, and the overclasses themselves remove the personal victory animations for each character (excluding Alm and Celica), so I don't think they put a whole lot of effort into said DLC.

[Emperor Hardin]

I must admit I would've liked it if after the player crossed the boarder into Rigel, all Mila statues were replaced by Duma statues.

There is a Duma statue in the game, but you can't save on it.

Most likely the Mila statues are just there for player convenience rather then exiting in story.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Emperor Hardin

[SoulWeaver]

As Hardin said, there is one Duma Statue, though it's referred to as a Duma Idol in-game - it bears the challenge that you have to pass in order to get to the gates of the Living and Dead, if memory serves. It is curious that there aren't more, though.

[Jotari]

8 hours ago, Hawkwing said:

That was for the DLC, after the main game was (presumably) finished, so they had the time to create the statue models. That, and the overclasses themselves remove the personal victory animations for each character (excluding Alm and Celica), so I don't think they put a whole lot of effort into said DLC.

You're simultaniously saying they did and didn't put the effort into creating those DLCs.

5 hours ago, SoulWeaver said:

As Hardin said, there is one Duma Statue, though it's referred to as a Duma Idol in-game - it bears the challenge that you have to pass in order to get to the gates of the Living and Dead, if memory serves. It is curious that there aren't more, though.

Oh really? Is that in Duma's Temple? Maybe where the teleporters are?

[Hawkwing]

4 hours ago, Jotari said:

You're simultaniously saying they did and didn't put the effort into creating those DLCs.

Yeaaah I could have worded that better. The DLC was probably made after the main game was done, so they had the time to create the statues and classes from scratch. They did understandably use the same room to save resources. I suppose I didn't find the overclasses that impressive, and I've heard elsewhere that they felt lazy in general, just adding an extra skill or magic spells to an already existing class.

4 hours ago, Jotari said:

Oh really? Is that in Duma's Temple? Maybe where the teleporters are?

No, that was the Fear Mountain Shrine, where you challenged said statue to a difficult fight and gained Duma's Lance in return.

Now that I think about it, maybe Duma saw that the Mila allowed people to worship her indirectly through statues, while she could lazily stay in her temple, and vowed never to do that, instead wishing to be worshiped directly. Who knows, maybe he even walked among the general populace before he went mad. Again, it would have been interesting to see what the Duma Faithful was like before the events of the game.

Though if you think about it, there are only six places where Mila has a statue in Zofia, and of those, two of them are graves (the Deliverance Hideout and the Seabound Shrine), one has access to a resurrection shrine (Dragon Shrine), one is a repurposed dungeon (the Sylvan Shrine, which has corpses lying around and prison cells, so make of that what you will), one is a humble shrine (Thief Shrine), and one is located in her Temple, so it's not like they're in every single town and castle.

[Emperor Hardin]

When you get down to it, in the original, the Mila statues were there for you to save and because they probably didn't have the time to create a Duma statue sprite for Rigel.

In the remake, the Mila statues are the only saving point because they are following the original like 4 movement Barons.

Basically the Mila statue in Fear Mountain Shrine exists only in gameplay, not story.